zondag 28 september 2014

Neoliberal Eternal War

OpEdNews Op Eds 9/27/2014 at 13:26:28

Will You Be Free: Caught in the Trap of Permanent War

By Chris Floyd (about the author) Permalink (Page 1 of 1 pages)
Related Topic(s): Attack; Chaos; Fear; Isis; Syria, Add Tags Add to My Group(s)

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Headlined to H2 9/27/14

Cross-posted from Empire Burlesque

(image by Artwork by Frans Masereel as collected in Notre Temps from 1952.)

The murderous absurdity of the new American-led war in the Middle East almost defies commentary, although I'm currently working on a piece that tries to thread through the obfuscation. In the meantime, below is something I wrote about one of our earlier wars in the region -- but as we now live in a state of permanent war, it remains sadly apt for today ... and no doubt far into the future.

The questions in the lines are aimed chiefly at all those who give their support -- however grudgingly, reluctantly, with great sweatdrops of blood and wringing of hands -- to the continuing series of military attacks by Western powers in the Middle East, East Asia and Africa for the ostensible reason of quelling terrorism.
For after each such incursion, the question comes again: are you free now? Is it better now? Are you free from the fear of terrorism (a fear so expertly and copiously stoked by our elites)? Is it better now? Is it over now? Have our violent attacks made us -- or the people in our target nations -- freer, safer, prosperous, at peace? Even when there is "victory" -- Saddam ousted, the Taliban ousted, Gadafy ousted -- has this brought peace and freedom to anyone ... or simply more and more and ever more conflict, extremism, chaos and blood.
And now the fear has come round again: another war, more mountains of dead, more cities in ruins, more hatred spread, more extremism created. Yet even if ISIS is forced back from the territory it now occupies in Syria and Iraq (thanks to the hellholes of chaos and instablity that Western actions have induced in both those countries), the question will be hanging in the blood-flecked mist: are we free now?
WILL YOU BE FREE?

When the guns no longer sound
When the dead are in the ground
When the foe hangs from the tree
Will you be free?
Will you be free?

When blood and iron rule the day
When ash and bone mix with the clay
And choke the fruits of victory
Will you be free?
Will you be free?

When the children of the slain
Cry for revenge to ease their pain
Lost in the shadows you'll never see
Will you be free?
Will you be free?
When the fear comes round again
When they call for troops to send
To some new war across the sea
Will you be free?"
Will you be free?

Chris Floyd is an American journalist. His work has appeared in print and online in venues all over the world, including The Nation, Counterpunch, Columbia Journalism Review, the Christian Science Monitor, Il Manifesto, the Moscow Times and many (more...)